absurd deduction game.

The morning light, like diluted milk, streamed softly through the glass window and spilled onto the floor of Yu Xing's room.

Yu Xing opened her eyes, showing no signs of grogginess from just waking up; her mind was already fully alert.

As a tree, he doesn't need to have a long period of deep sleep like humans. His underground roots spread all night, allowing him to absorb some of the coolness from the earth's veins, making his mind more introspective. He opened the system and checked; it was six in the morning, and he had slept for more than four hours.

The room was quiet, with only the occasional chirping of birds outside the window, a sign that Yolikev Town was about to awaken. Yu Xing got up and walked to the window, glancing out instinctively.

The streets were deserted, but unlike the deathly stillness of the night, this was a tranquility waiting to be filled. He listened intently; Zeng Lai's snoring in the next room was deep and rhythmic, while Carlos's room was completely silent, as if someone was fiddling with something.

There was no sign of Qu Xianqing in the house; she hadn't returned yet.

Yu Xing raised an eyebrow almost imperceptibly.

Although the fact that Carlos's paper doll didn't move meant that Qu Xianqing was safe, the fact that she didn't return all night still made Shu a little worried.

He changed into a simple linen shirt and dark trousers, still wearing his coffee-colored long trench coat, and went downstairs quietly.

In the living room, Yi Qing was floating gracefully beneath the chandelier, facing the rising sun outside the window, slowly waving her jade-bone fan, seemingly absorbing some essence of the morning glow—although ghosts shouldn't theoretically need this.

Upon seeing Yu Xing come downstairs, Yi Qing nodded slightly as a greeting.

Yu Xing didn't disturb him posing and went straight out the door.

The morning air, moistened by dew and slightly cool, slightly diluted the tempting aroma of various foods... no, a mixture of monsters, that constantly lingered around my nose.

He was going to buy some breakfast for his teammates, since he had been eating all night while his teammates were still hungry.

Yu Xing strolled towards Wind Chime Avenue, a few streets away—the most bustling commercial district in Yolikev.

Yolikev presents a completely different face during the day compared to at night. Although a sense of tension can still be felt beneath the surface of the bustling city, there are already a few pedestrians on the streets.

The horse-drawn carriage made a crisp clattering sound as it rolled over the stone-paved road. Milkmen pushed their carts, delivering bottled milk from house to house. Shop assistants were taking down the door panels, preparing to start their day's business.

The faces of the people bore the weariness inherent in life, but there was no pervasive panic as one might have imagined. Yu Xing keenly noticed that the people who lived here had more of a dependence and a habitual numbness in their eyes. When they talked, they would subconsciously look towards the direction of the church spire, as if there was an invisible barrier there that could block out all darkness.

Just as he expected, those who had the ability and courage to move their entire families had already left when the strange occurrences began to become more frequent.

The rest were either the poor who were unable to leave, or the middle class and the wealthy who placed all their hopes on the Church of the Mother of Harvest.

The prestige accumulated by the Church of Orthodoxy over hundreds of years became the cornerstone of stabilizing people's hearts at this moment. As long as the church bells still rang on time and the priests and nuns in white robes still walked on the streets, most people were willing to believe that the disaster would eventually pass and that the protection of the Mother Goddess would always exist.

This belief itself constituted a faint yet peculiar force, lingering over the town and preventing those purely dark things from running too rampant in broad daylight.

Shops lined both sides of Wind Chime Avenue, with all sorts of signs. Yu Xing quickly found his target—a bakery with a small storefront but a gleaming window and a rich aroma of wheat wafting out.

The signboard reads "Grandma Pearl's Sweet Stove" in cursive script. Both the stove and the grandmother are very hardworking, and the shop is already open for business.

He pushed open the shop door, and the copper bell on the lintel rang with a clear, melodious sound.

"Good morning, young man." A kind voice came from behind the counter.

A slightly plump old woman with silver-white hair, neatly combed and wearing a clean apron, was standing behind the counter. Her face was rosy and her smile was kind, like an apple that had been baked perfectly by a warm fire.

Seeing Yu Xing come in, her slightly cloudy but kind eyes curved into crescents: "So early? What would you like? Freshly baked wheat bread, as soft as a cloud."

The small shop was filled with a comforting sweet aroma, and the glass counter displayed some tempting breads and pastries.

Yu Xing's gaze swept over the basket of small round breads that looked the most unadorned yet exuded the purest aroma of wheat: "Please give me six of these."

"Alright." Granny Pearl neatly wrapped the bread in parchment paper, then slipped in a small, golden-brown bow-shaped cookie. "This is for you, young man. You look unfamiliar; are you the new investigator?"

Yu Xing took the bread, nodded, and paid the corresponding amount in pennies.

"May the Mother Goddess bless you with success in your work." Grandma Pearl drew a symbol of the Mother Goddess of Harvest on her chest and said sincerely, "With you all here, an old woman like me can sleep more peacefully."

Leaving the bakery, Yu Xing slowly walked back, carrying the warm paper package.

The morning sun gradually brightened, dispelling the lingering gloom of the night and gilding the town's buildings with a warm golden hue. If one didn't know what this place would look like after nightfall, the scene before one's eyes could almost be described as peaceful and serene.

When they returned to the office, Carlos and Zeng Lai were already up. Zeng Lai was yawning and sprawled on the sofa, looking like she hadn't woken up yet, while Carlos was energetically fiddling with a delicate mechanical bird on the coffee table.

"Oh? You went to buy breakfast?" Carlos saw the paper package in Yu Xing's hand and laughed, "You have good taste, Captain. Grandma Pearl's bread is the best, but I haven't tried it this early in the morning yet... The bread should still be fresh out of the oven and piping hot right now, right?"

Yu Xing nodded in agreement with the description "hot and fresh," and placed the bread on the coffee table. Just then, the door was pushed open again, and a faint smell of blood wafted in first.

Then there was Qu Xianqing, who showed no signs of fatigue.

Her high ponytail was still neat, the hem of her trench coat was stained with some unknown dirt, and she carried a faint smell that was a mixture of the unique smell of the slums and the smell of blood.

"Sister Qu, you're back!" Zeng Lai readily chose the same address as Carlos, grabbed onto his leg, and sat up straight.

"Hmm." Qu Xianqing responded briefly, her gaze sweeping over the bread on the table. "Perfect timing, I'm hungry."

She quickly washed up, changed into clean clothes, and came back. The group of people and the ghost gathered around the coffee table and shared the soft wheat bread. The ribbon-shaped cookies that Granny Pearl had given them were handed by Yu Xing to Zeng Lai, who seemed to need the most sugar.

"How's the situation in the slums?" Carlos asked as he elegantly tore apart a piece of bread.

He had certainly been there in the previous phase and had dealt with quite a few monsters, but he didn't know if the situation would change significantly in the second phase.

Qu Xianqing took a sip of water, swallowed the food in her mouth, and then slowly spoke, her clear, cold voice carrying a hint of the night's chill: "It's bad. The infiltration of strange events is more widespread than expected."

Last night, she wandered the streets alone and came to the slums.

Although she was alone, she actually saw several other divination practitioners on the way, but they didn't interact and remained at peace.

Upon entering the slums, the researchers tacitly found their own areas to search, completely avoiding her starting point and making their "unwillingness to compete" attitude crystal clear.

Qu Xianqing was delighted with this, and she began to look around at her surroundings.

Unlike the "cleanliness" of the wealthy neighborhoods, which are shrouded in silence and fear, the nights in the slums are filthy and rotten.

There are no neatly paved stone paths here, only muddy, uneven trails, filled with an indescribable stench of sewage and garbage, fermenting in the night wind.

The low, crowded shacks resembled ugly mushrooms growing together, crookedly huddled together. Most of the windows were blocked with rags or wooden boards, with only a few weak, low-quality candlelights seeping through the cracks. Instead of providing a sense of security, they resembled the wary eyes of wild beasts in the dark.

Some people are working late into the night at home.

A small river flows through the town of Yolikev, passing only through the factory and slum areas. The filthy riverbed meanders through the shantytowns, with thick layers of filth and waste floating on the surface, emitting a nauseating stench.

Qu Xianqing took a sniff; the air here seemed to be perpetually filled with the smell of poverty, despair, and cheap alcohol.

She calmly gripped the blood-red longsword, walking silently in the shadows, her senses spreading outwards like an invisible spiderweb, capturing every discordant fluctuation in the darkness.

Soon, she found several homeless people curled up in tattered bedding or lying directly on the cold ground in different alleys along the way. Most of them were disabled due to accidents while working and were unable to sell their physical labor. They had spent all their meager compensation and had no family to take care of them, so they could only beg for a living.

Qu Xianqing's expression remained unchanged as he continued walking forward.

Her soul was not in this body; most of the time, she was as indifferent as a dead person, and unable to empathize.

The current task is to investigate the situation.

Soon after, at the end of one of the dirtiest and narrowest dead ends, she saw an unusually quiet figure.

The homeless man was lying face down in a contorted position, with one arm bent at an unnatural angle. In the dim light from afar, Qu Xianqing could see several fat flies buzzing around him, occasionally landing on his neck and exposed skin.

Death is not uncommon here.

Qu Xianqing did not stop walking; she merely glanced around before preparing to continue.

But just as she was about to cross the alleyway, her senses detected a faint energy fluctuation emanating from the "corpse," unlike that of an ordinary corpse—a bloodlust and chaos that was taking shape.

She paused, turned quietly, and walked into the alley.

The closer you get, the more pronounced the strange smell, a mixture of decay and new life, becomes. Startled, the flies fly up in a small circle in dissatisfaction before eagerly returning to their original spots.

Just as Qu Xianqing was only three steps away from the "corpse"—

The previously motionless human body suddenly twitched!
Immediately afterwards, he sprang up from the ground in a way that completely defied human anatomy, with his joints twisting in the opposite direction!
His face turned, his skin an unhealthy bluish-gray, his eyes only showing cloudy whites, his mouth unnaturally open, a sharp, thin, and not yet fully formed black mouthpart struggling to emerge from his throat, making a strange "hoarse" sound.

His body also turned black, and his appearance underwent some strange changes. This was...

A mutating addict.

Qu Xianqing was stunned for a moment, confirming that this was the same kind of monster that had been killed at Felia's house not long ago. Because the mutation was not yet complete, the system had not given her any corresponding prompts.

But it—this already dead vagrant—had already developed the instincts of a monster.

Although it had not yet fully transformed, it sensed Qu Xianqing's presence, and the mosquito wings on its back began to flap. With an instinctive craving for fresh brain marrow, it staggered and pounced towards Qu Xianqing!
Qu Xianqing's eyes turned cold. Without the slightest hesitation, the blood-red sword light flashed in the darkness like a fleeting glimpse of a startled bird, then suddenly went out.

The half-finished addict froze in place as the monster was cleaved in two by a single sword strike, filthy blood spurting out. Its still-undeveloped mandibles twitched weakly a few times before it, along with its main body, crashed heavily back to where it had been lying, splashing up a cloud of dirty water.

The flies buzzed around again, this time with an even clearer target.

Qu Xianqing wiped the blood off his sword and left the alley without expression.

The situation in the slums was indeed more serious. Monsters that could hardly hide in the rich areas could hide in almost every shadowy corner here.

In the time that followed, she encountered and swiftly dealt with several low-level monsters lurking in the shadows—a rotting piece of flesh hiding in an abandoned wooden barrel, attempting to entangle passersby with its thorny tentacles; an invisible vengeful spirit hanging upside down from the eaves, disguised as a rag, which would suddenly fall and suffocate pedestrians by covering their heads…

These monsters are not very strong, but their numbers and their use of the environment make them more threatening than the monsters in the wealthy areas.

As she crossed a slightly wider street filled with discarded furniture and clutter, a swaying figure approached from the front.

Qu Xianqing knew that many people here were still awake, but this was the first person who dared to walk on the street. She immediately sensed the other person's presence—it was a living person.

So she began to sized him up.

He was a emaciated homeless man. Of course, at this time, no one but a homeless person would be looking for death outdoors.

He wore a tattered, thick coat covered in patches of various colors, the original color of which was almost impossible to discern. Even on this not-so-cold night, he wrapped himself up tightly, his hands wrapped around his body as if trying to ward off the invisible chill.

His complexion was an unhealthy sallow yellow, his cheeks were deeply sunken, and his eye sockets were dark. He walked very strangely, with unsteady steps, stumbling like a sleepwalker, unresponsive to everything around him, just moving forward aimlessly.

Qu Xianqing stopped in her tracks.

This person's state was very strange. It wasn't the outward malice of a monster, nor the decay of a dying person, but rather a kind of... empty, dazed state, as if he had suffered some kind of severe fright.

Could it be someone who witnessed something but was lucky enough to survive?
Isn't this the chosen NPC who delivers the quest? (End of Chapter)